


Deadeye Dragon

by SlackerEmeritus



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Death, Gen, M/M, McCree is a sappy cuss, Violence, nothing super graphic though, redshirts everywhere
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-04
Updated: 2016-07-04
Packaged: 2018-07-20 01:11:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,194
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7385023
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SlackerEmeritus/pseuds/SlackerEmeritus
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Hanzo needs a focus for Dragonstrike, but he's lost his bow and arrows. McCree and his gun will do in a pinch.</p><p>Based on <a href="http://maonethedwarf.tumblr.com/post/146585490043">this Tumblr post</a> and these <a href="http://luminositylayer.tumblr.com/post/146820036992">two</a> <a href="http://miss-mini-meal.tumblr.com/post/146695336611">comics</a> over on Tumblr.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Deadeye Dragon

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Rebecca Hb (beckyh2112)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/beckyh2112/gifts).



McCree blocked Hanzo in with his cybernetic arm and nudged as if to pull the archer behind him. Hanzo, bruised and battered, out of arrows, bow broken and abandoned halfway across the compound, and squinting angrily through a swollen, black eye, glowered up at him in indignation at the attempt.

"What are you doing?" he demanded. McCree glanced down at him over one shoulder with an uneasy grin, false cheer glinting under the blood from a split lip and a broken nose. He looked so strange without his hat, Hanzo thought. But this day had been strange and unpleasant almost from the start.

"Things could get a bit… messy," McCree said, wheezing faintly and trying to stifle it. His cracked ribs twinged hard whenever he moved just wrong or breathed too deeply and it made his eyes cross. "You just stay behind me now, and when I give the signal, run for it."

"I beg your pardon?" Hanzo's scowl deepened and didn't relent, not even when McCree tried to give him that cocked-eyebrow smirk he always wore when he talked himself up. Not even when the sound of the blast doors at the other end of their dead-end corridor being blown open threatened to deafen them both.

"You're faster on your feet," McCree answered, once his ears stopped ringing, as if that was all the explanation needed. "I'll hold 'em off, you get outta here and back to the others." Outrage burned in Hanzo's eyes and set him to grinding his jaw. As if he needed protecting!

"I do not _run_ from battle," he snapped. "Especially when there is nowhere to run." He gestured stiffly at their surroundings.

"Why d'you gotta argue at a time like this?" McCree fired back, struggling with the urge to sigh in exasperation. He didn't think his ribs would appreciate it too much.

"Because you are acting a fool!" said Hanzo. Shouts and footsteps rang down the corridor; the enemy was nearly upon them. He swore under his breath, then grabbed McCree by the shoulder and pulled hard, turning the gunman to face him.

"Hey! What the _hell,_ Hanzo?" McCree fought with his pain and Hanzo dragging on his arm to keep his gun trained on the intersection where Talon agents would show up in moments, ready to put them both down. "L'eggo! You tryin' to get us both killed right now?" Hanzo swore at him in Japanese again and knocked his left arm aside with a vicious chop to the inside of his elbow. "Hey!" he yelped. "Watch the arm, wouldja? That hurt!"

"It would hurt less if you stopped fighting!" Hanzo barked, pushing away McCree's cybernetic hand as the gunman tried to peel him off.

"Get behind me already, you stupid son of a bitch! They'll be here any second now!" McCree shouted, somewhere between pleading and angry. It was almost like Hanzo didn't even want to be saved, and he hated it.

"Absolutely _not!_ " Hanzo snarled as he wrestled his way to a hold on McCree's gun with his left hand. McCree swore fit to make his grandmother roll in her grave and started trying in earnest to remove Hanzo before the archer really did get them both dead.

He was still fighting – Hanzo had a tighter grip than he expected – and he realised only once he saw the first operatives round the corner that of _course_ Hanzo could lock him down, with the strength gained from drawing a longbow all day, every day, for _years._ He lost the last shreds of his composure, voice turning frantic, real terror creeping into his eyes. They were going to die. _Hanzo_ was going to die and it would be his fault for dragging Hanzo along on this op.

"Hanzo–!" he wheezed, verging on panic. There were more Talon mooks than he had bullets bearing down on them and taking aim.

" _Enough!_ " Hanzo's eyes flashed bright with fury and his fingers felt like steel as he wrapped his right arm around McCree's back and pulled him in tight, aiming the six-shooter for them both. The tattoos on his arm rippled as McCree watched; blue wisps of power rose off his skin like heat shimmer off the Mojave sands, then burst into brilliant life, wreathing their arms and the gun in serpentine coils. It was so hot it stole all the air from McCree's lungs, and the pressure squeezed his chest so he couldn't inhale even if he wanted. How he wasn't burning alive, he had no idea.

He knew it was coming, and still, he wasn't ready.

" _LET THE DRAGONS CONSUME YOU!_ " Hanzo cried, clear as a silver trumpet ringing out over a battlefield and savage as a killer.

The dragons appeared on their master's command, twisting, viper-headed things with feathered crests of gold running down their backs; McCree had seen them dozens of times before, but he'd never been at ground zero for any of it. It felt like being struck by lightning when they burst forth, roaring and rattling so loud that it sent the first wave of Talon agents to the floor clutching their ears, and for an instant McCree forgot how to think. Power shot through him, vibrating down to his bones, rooting him to the spot. All he could do was hang onto his gun and Hanzo for dear life. Hanzo faltered only slightly, only briefly, at the sight of the unfamiliar summoned beasts and the way they curled close rather than charging into the enemy. Then he looked at the gun, at McCree's trembling arm, at the wide-eyed look of shock on his face.

"McCree!" Hanzo roared over the tumult. " _Fire!_ " The word was a gunshot-crack in his ears, snapping McCree from his daze. Hanzo's hand tightened on his, steadying his aim, and he sucked in his first breath in what felt like forever, lungs burning on searing-hot air, and pulled the trigger. His heart leapt in his chest, tension unfurling in one great thrumming rush, and for a split-second he actually passed out, only staying on his feet because Hanzo stood with him, steady and firm as a stone. He blinked back to consciousness and the corridor was suddenly full of blinding blue light and dying screams, then silence. McCree stared, stunned, at the human wreckage strewn down the length of the hall.

"Wh," he breathed, voice gone.

"Let's go," Hanzo said roughly, and only then did McCree realise his left hand had a vise grip on Hanzo's sleeve and that Hanzo was trying to release him. It took more effort than he liked to uncurl his fingers, and worse still, every limb felt rubbery and weak, tingling. He had to steady himself with one hand on Hanzo's shoulder as they picked their way through the bodies and for once, Hanzo said nothing about the uninvited contact. McCree looked half-dead; he found it hard to begrudge his support after using the man without warning him.

"Hanzo, I… I need a minute," McCree finally croaked as they cut through the fence and slipped into the cover of the wilderness, leaving the compound and the cacophony of alarm claxons behind. Hanzo paused mid-stride; this was unfamiliar territory to him or he wouldn't even entertain the thought. McCree had led them here in the first place. He stifled a sigh then and pushed for one of the nearer mesas rather than straight to the arroyo where they'd hidden the dropship. McCree grew increasingly heavy as they walked, limp more and more pronounced with every step, and Hanzo thought for a moment he might pass out again, but he kept walking, so Hanzo kept going as well. It felt like an hour before they reached the rocky hills at the foot of the mesa, and then a small crevice under an overhang where Hanzo finally relented. He guided McCree to the back where he could sit and recover, and McCree just mumbled his gratitude, too hurting and too exhausted for pride.

"Drink," said Hanzo as he knelt, offering McCree the flask from his hip. McCree shook his head; this was a terrible time for booze. Hanzo frowned at him. "You need to drink. It is water, if that is the reason for your concern." McCree blinked groggily; water, he could do, and he nodded his thanks before taking two deep gulps. Still ice cold somehow, it felt like heaven on his parched throat.

"Thanks again," he murmured, voice still scratchy and raw. Hanzo shook his head once, yellow ribbons flashing in the dark.

"It's nothing," he replied, demurring, and took a sip for himself before tying the flask back into place. Quiet reigned for a few minutes, broken only by the scrape of McCree's spurs against the rock and the skitter of tiny things running through the dust and brush. McCree drifted in and out of consciousness for seconds at a time, eyelids heavy, whole body heavy, and Hanzo made no judgements, but watched the night outside their shelter for signs of pursuit. He felt naked without his bow and their only option without it was McCree's gun. He didn't look forward to using that hand cannon to defend them. Hopefully, he thought, the rest would get McCree steady enough to handle that matter.

"How long was I out?" McCree blurted out suddenly, sitting upright. Hanzo glanced at him over one shoulder.

"Seconds at best," he said. "We are not yet pursued, but we should not stay here for long. If we keep moving, we should make it back to the dropship before dawn."

"…Right," McCree answered and bit back a gasp as sitting up sent hot knives up his side and back. He'd never hear the end of it when they got back to Gibraltar and Mercy got a look at his sorry state.

"Lean on me if you must," Hanzo went on in a softer tone, one that brought McCree up short for an instant. "But we must move."

The long walk back to their dropship was silent and painful, McCree staggering along on his twisted knee and breathing harsh and shallow, and Hanzo increasingly gritting his teeth against the pins and needles in his back where he'd landed hard and the ache in his bruised middle. They both sighed as they finally sank into the padded seats and the hatch sealed behind them. Hanzo eyed the seatbelt and strongly debated leaving it rather than have the straps aggravating his wounds while McCree tapped in the takeoff commands and coordinates for the watchpoint, then set everything to auto-pilot. Hanzo watched him nod off again as the ship lifted into the air. Watched him wake up and fade out again three more times during the flight, and eventually dozed himself. He woke with a small start to McCree watching the monitors with tired, swollen eyes.

"How much longer?" Hanzo asked even as he looked at the console.

"Not much," McCree said, scrubbing at the blood on his lip and wincing. "Mercy's gonna kill me."

"After she kills me, perhaps," Hanzo countered, looking away and out the windscreen uncomfortably. "I… you have my apologies," he added. "I should have warned you." McCree would undoubtedly be better off had he not been an anchor for the dragons and Mercy could surely tell.

"…About that," McCree ventured, and Hanzo looked back at him. McCree had a haunted look about him that didn't help Hanzo feel any better in the matter. "Is – is it always like that?" Hanzo arched one eyebrow, quizzical, and McCree wasn't sure how to put it more clearly. His memories of the event were chaotic to say the least, but he _did_ remember how it felt. "When you do the thing," he said, pantomiming drawing a bow. "The dragons. Does it feel like that every time you do it?"

"Yes," Hanzo said without hesitation. "Every time."

"How d'you – _how?_ " McCree pressed, breathless, with that wide-eyed, shocked expression on his face again.

"I am a Shimada," Hanzo answered as if that explained everything. To him, it did. When McCree stared at him blankly, he grimaced. "I have grown used to it," he added slowly. "But only my family can control them. There is no choice in the matter." McCree reeled back in his seat at the idea that Hanzo went through that every time he summoned the dragons and hardly batted an eyelash.

"I don't think I could do that again," he said finally, shaking at the mere idea.

"And you will not have to." Hanzo, after a moment to consider the propriety of it, clasped his shoulder with one hand. "But… thank you. For bearing it with me this once."

"S-sure thing," McCree said on an exhale, caught flat-footed by the unexpected show of gratitude and the faint hint of a smile pulling at the corners of Hanzo's eyes. He said nothing else about it or any other topics; neither did Hanzo, both of them passing the rest of the flight in a newly, weirdly comfortable silence in between naps.

Maybe, McCree thought as the landing lights at Gibraltar came into view an hour after sunrise – maybe for that smile, he could do it again.


End file.
